Telluride: The Break Down

As of 2:05pm EST today, Phish fans know who is, and who is not, going to see Phish at Town Park in Telluride, CO. With only 9,000 2 day passes available, tickets were not easy to get.

Tickets were far harder to get than Red Rocks 2009 tickets for a couple reasons. Telluride will hold a bit less people than Red Rocks did, also, since you can only buy 2 day passes, it’s 9,000 tickets total. Unlike Red Rocks, which holds 9,500 people, there were 4 individual shows for sale. That means there was a total of 38,000 tickets floating around. Also, Telluride tickets are almost impossible to by second hand. The only second hand tickets people can buy from friends or scalpers are the ones that were available thru Phish’s ticket lotto. The amount sold through the lotto was only about 3,000. The 4,000 sold online today and the 2,000 sold at the box office in Telluride are all paperless tickets. The person who buys the tickets must be present with the credit/debit card used in the purchase the day of the concert with their ID to prove it’s them. It’s safe to say that the 3,000 Phish.com tickets are going to be sky rocketing in price. As of now, there are no tickets available on StubHub and only 12 tickets on TicketsNow, the cheapest being $950.00, going up to $3,500–the ticket supply is at the lowest it has ever been for a Phish show, possibly ever.

Telluride, about 7-8 hours west of Denver, will give the string of cars filing into the small town a gorgeous mountain drive. When people arrive and get their wrist bands some will go to hotels, some will camp. There are 3 camp sites available nearby.

Town Park- This site is next to the concert grounds, it is the most scenic and also the most expensive at about 70 dollars/person.

Telluride High School- This site is next to the local highschool. People that stay here will be allowed to use the locker room showers for a small fee. It is within walking distance to the concert grounds. This is about 60 dollars/night. Oh, and they say no tobacco because it’s on school grounds. I suppose no alcohol or anything else, right? Right.

Lawson Hill- This is a few miles west of Telluride on Hwy 145. It is a baseball field with no shade. This site is also about 60 dollars /night.

People going to Deer Creek just 2 nights later are in for a rather large jaunt. It will be about a 24 hour drive. Assuming fans sleep until about 8am, They won’t get to Noblesville until about 11am (adjusted for time zone change) the day of the concert. And this is assuming they don’t stop to sleep. If they do decide to sleep, they can plan on getting to Deer Creek right around when the show is starting. (I’m curious to see what I decide to do)

Last time Phish was in Telluride was 1991 when they played at The Elk Ballroom. Some standouts from the two-night stint were The Landlady>Destiny Unbound, Oh Kee Pa Ceremony>Foam, Wilson>Dinner and a Movie>Stash, Whipping Post and an early Tube.

I think it’s safe to say that Phish, along with the fans, understand how special of a place this is. These two concerts should be amazing. Phish knew Red Rocks last year was a huge deal, too–and threw down accordingly.

Notes: Whipping Post (first since September 21, 1990, or 149 shows) featured Fishman’s hilariously inept debut on fretless guitar. The Bowie intro two Charlie Chan signals as well as Oom Pa Pa and Simpsons signals. Harpua included On Top of Old Smokey teases from Mike. The lyrics to Gin were altered to reference a hot tub, referencing some friends who had partied at the hotel hot tub earlier that day.